Florida Power Nuclear Plant Hit With Fine

September 14, 1989|By Kenneth Michael Of The Sentinel Staff

The staff of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission Wednesday recommended fining Florida Power Corp. $100,000 for violating regulations in the testing of safety equipment to be used to avert a so-called ''meltdown'' if a serious accident were to occur at the Crystal River nuclear power plant.

The NRC said studies of the plant's program ''indicate failure to implement adequate management and program controls to assure that equipment was properly qualified and to verify that equipment was properly installed in the field.''

Florida Power spokesman Mark Jacobs described the program as being designed ''to provide great assurance that essential plant safety equipment would continue to operate effectively during and following an accident where increased temperatures and pressures and elevated water levels could be expected inside the plant.''

The company has 30 days to pay the civil penalty or to appeal the decision. The nuclear plant is near the town of Crystal River in Citrus County on the state's west coast.

Jacobs said the company will not decide whether to appeal until it receives a copy of the NRC report.

''We remain confident that the plant emergency equipment in the Crystal River plant would work efficiently before and after an accident should it ever occur,'' he said.

The ''environmental qualification'' of electrical equipment at nuclear power plants was to have been completed by November 1985, but the NRC said Florida Power has just begun implementing a comprehensive program. Stewart D. Ebneter, regional administrator of the NRC's office in Atlanta, said the base penalty of $50,000 for the violation was doubled because of the company's poor performance and prior notice of problems in equipment testing.